Verification
Over the years, Couchsurfing has used different "verification" tools and advertised changing associated benefits.
A new "verification" system was announced on May 1st, 2009 with this post:
IMPORTANT News from the AMT about verification!
Posted May 1st, 2009 - 15:25 by Jonathan Lewis from San Francisco, United States (Permalink)
Hello all,
It's Gadget! I have some VERY important news to communicate with you. As you may know, we have been working diligently to improve and streamline the verification process. This is an area that the membership has been very interested in improving.
The verification overhaul may launch as soon as Monday. (That is MAY, but very soon, none the less). This will be a very noticeable change to all profiles on the site and to every member thumbnail on the site. The changes will be obvious, and you may/will get questions about if from members. Just let them know what you can, and as we release the details, we will explain more about it.
The strategy behind the changes is to make verification better explained, and more visible in the hopes of increasing the number of verified members. We want more verified members not only to make the website safer, but also to increase our funds so that we can do more for members in every aspect of our services.
You may (I know you!) cringe a little at the money aspect of this. There are many debates that argue both sides of the topic, and I am certain that it will continue. It's a healthy debate and it not only makes sense to discuss it, but does us all good to self monitor and find the best practices. The fact is that every organization, whether organized for profit or not, as in our case, needs operating capital. This is our primary source of cash flow, and to expand exponentially past 1 million members takes increased funding. We can discuss oversight and other issues in their own place and time.
(Important part coming!)
The changes were based on the member survey we conducted. (Your opinions do count!) The survey revealed that many members didn't understand verification, and that they were more motivated to become verified by their desire to support the community then by their desire to feel more safe. Based on this member input, the changes will make more obvious that verification is a way for members to support the CS community through the associated donation.
Our new verification slogan is "Give more couch." It reflects the fact that each verified member's donation gives more people the opportunity to surf and host.
We appreciate your time and kind attention to this. I will continue to speak to this topic as we approach and install it. The AMT appreciates all the hard work, dedication and good acts that the Ambassadors of CS do, you are all to be congratulated and thanked in any way we can!
Personally, it is an honor and pleasure to be at your service. I look forward to continuing to update you as we grow and learn together.
Of course, if you have any questions, comments or concerns, please feel free to contact me.
Big Love
gadget
for the LT/AMT
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The announcement was met with strong protest from the CS ambassador and member communities and the system subsequently underwent changes:
Posted June 25th, 2009 - 23:15 by Jonathan Lewis from San Francisco, United States (Permalink)
@Couchista
Thank you for the question. I must plead some ignorance, but I will answer the best I can.
The Tech Team, under the direction of a special project team spent months on this change. I know that they did not (as none of us do) work in a vacuum. There were plenty of arguments and revisions, and eventually, you can see the results.
So, your question is about exclusion and inclusion. We do seek ways to include everyone in our organization in every way that we can. There are many, many examples of this. You are CORRECT though. This seems like an oxymoron. (meaning that it contradicts itself) Why would a community based on inclusion exclude those who do not have plastic cards in their wallets? The answer (to date) has been in verification, there is a layer of protection. You can read many of the posts that argue about it, but at the end of the day, there are two principal drivers for verification: as a safety measure and more importantly (by members survey) is that people want to contribute to the greater community and keep CS around for a long time to come. They want to help sustain us.
So, to that end, we have taken several steps to offer verification in places where cards are not common. We are in the final stages of preparing our EU banking partnerships to accept other methods of contributions for verification and other purposes in methods that are more normal and typical for other regions. This is not very simple, as these methods need to prove the same things that our current process does. So we are trying with diligence to make this available to a wider range of places and people. Thank you for your patience with this.
In the meantime, I see that lot of people have lots of checks, shamrocks, happy faces, etc that they have photoshopped in, etc. That's cool. Hey, we love individual thinkers, admire and respect other opinions, and dig innovation. I laughed at the shamrock one, that was cool! The bottom line is that this is a quick visual method of conveying to a user that you have been verified.
I have also mentioned your question to the project management team that handled the retool of the verification program and they also thank you for your comments.
Thank you also for being so passionate about our community. Your questions are always welcome.
Big Love
gadget
PS> symbols, lines, check marks, whatever, do not reveal your heart and your mind. In your profile, and as an Ambassador, you reveal yourself plenty enough for us to know you, love you and support you.
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Three months later, Couchsurfing recognized its mistake and announced more changes to the "verification" system:
Verification Change goes live tonight (Monday) at 2300 PST
Posted July 27th, 2009 - 21:36 by Jonathan Lewis from San Francisco, United States (Permalink)
Last month, CouchSurfing updated its verification system. As you know, part of this update included a change in the imagery used on the site. The 'lock' has been removed, and replaced with a bar that shows specifically what information has been verified about a member: identity, location or none.
Our initial launch included two opposing images: a check mark for full verification, and a question mark for no verification. After it was released, both members and the CS volunteers who'd worked on the project felt that the question mark was a much stronger image than had been intended. Profiles with a question mark seemed to imply that a person was unreliable or untrustworthy.
The image was developed because CouchSurfing wants to communicate clearly to members which profiles we, as an organization, have fact-checked. The check mark signifies that both name and location have been checked, and the question mark that no information has been checked. It was never intended to create a situation where some members seemed to be less trustworthy than others; the goal of the images is to be clear about our ability to verify a member's statements. After seeing that this image can negatively effect the experience of members who choose not to get verified, we've decided to remove the question mark.
Thank you to members, volunteers and Ambassadors who weighed in on this issue! Every new feature is the result of a creative process, and every creative process involves trial and error. We consider every decision we make very carefully, but we cannot always predict how an idea will work out in the real CS community. Your feedback helps us understand how new features affect our community, and we're grateful that people care enough about CouchSurfing to help keep us moving in the right directions.
gadget
for the AMT and the COMMS Team